Poverty in the Philippines... my insights

Poverty deprives people of their security and well-being; peace of mind; education and robs them of their future. It is also a deprivation to clothing, shelter and education. It is lack of opportunity and loss of hope. 

As Mahatma Gandhi quoted "Poverty is the form of violence" - and we can clearly see this on the way robbers’ reason out when they are caught... "i have no money and my family is starving". 

In the philippines, we dont need to have statistics for us to believe how worst the poverty is. Let your eyes be the judge and then think of how i defined poverty. I have been overseas for almost a year now and I can see even I am away from home how Filipinos are suffering from poverty. 

It may be hard but i am really thinking if there is such a way that we can diminish poverty and increase Filipino life. However, it is so painful to think that even how much we wanted... hopes of getting out of it is quite impossible. 

There are so many reasons why we are still poor: 

1. Nation’s Debts. The main reason is because a large portion of our national budget goes to paying our foreign and domestic debts, instead of using it to build more roads, highways, bridges, schools, hospitals, housing units, railroads, irrigation, cable lines, and other public works; to raise the salaries and benefits of our public school teachers, policemen, soldiers, and government employees; and to fund more development and poverty-alleviation programs.

For every peso that the Filipino taxpayer pays to the government, a big part of it (about a third) only goes to our creditors. (http://emanila.com/philippines/2010/01/19/why-is-the-philippines-a-poor-country/)

2. Population mismanagement. This is the next major cause. Many people keep building families and producing children even if they are unprepared and have no money.

Through massive population management programs, the people should be informed that before building families, they first must have stable livelihoods, and savings for health care, children’s education, and emergencies, and that they should produce children only according to their financial means.

http://emanila.com/philippines/2010/01/19/why-is-the-philippines-a-poor-country/)

3. Corruption.  The abuse of public power, office, or resources by government officials or employees for personal gain, e.g. by extortion, soliciting or offering bribes. Such abuse of power also exists in academe, corporate and even religious organization. 

My insight on this; the government must needs to make sure that checks and balances is always audited. The president may have so much on his plate now but maybe at this time, it would be nice if he would be hands on to this. We all know the word "ningas kugon". We are just good at the start and after a while, we tend to forget things and become complacent on it. Resolving poverty issue is something that we should not be complacent and we can’t just have "siesta".  We have to take it seriously. 

As for me, this maybe too much but why not do this...

1. Corruption - termination from office is not enough. Why not make our law harder on this. I would suggest caning, jail and death penalty.

2. Population Mismanagement - Family planning should be our main priority. I believe in RH Bill as this will make a difference in a little way. Education about population and family making should start in first year highschool so students will have awareness. When i was teaching, I can sense that my students get excited when we start talking about love. 

3. National Debt - cut the budget of it and starts using those funds in creating farm to market roads, salaries of our government employees to make them more efficient and honest.

Unless we lessen poverty, we will continue on seeing slumps and beggars in the philippines. We will continue to feel unsafe and afraid of going out. There will be no justice and education will be very expensive.